Hidden Fire
by Julie Tulips
Summary: The story of Draco's younger sister, Morgan. Faced with the struggles that no girl should ever endure, this diamond in the rough will have to make sacrifices, expose both her good and her bad side, and figure out the essence of life and of herself. I do not own Harry Potter.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or any characters from Harry Potter. Only thing I own is Morgan's plot and her character. **

**AN: Hey everyone, this is my story of Morgan Malfoy, Draco's younger sister. Please Read and Review, if I get one review I write another chapter, that's my constant rule Hope you like it! Since this is based on a RolePlay from Omegle, half the credit goes to Peter for roleplaying Draco Malfoy. Enjoy! ~JT**

The cold floor sends chills through my soft feet as I brush the soles against the stone. My fingers lace through the flossy threads of the black quilt. My silky blond hair falls into my face and I brush it away with a wave of my pale fingers. The mattress under me is soft, but I don't want to sleep. There's unease in my heart, both soft and tender but hardened at the core. No one would suspect under my calm face that I won't be able to sleep tonight.

As I watch my brother fiddling with his sleeves and running his fingers through his blond hair, his pale face riddled with hidden traces of pain and desperation, my uneasiness finds itself a place and turns into fear. Fear for him. If something happened to him, the older boy who was once afraid of thunder, who dried my tears in the depths of the night, whose eyes appear in every of my frail thoughts, I don't know what I'd do. Throw myself off the top tower of the Manor, probably.

I stand up and the elaborate, heavy folds of my nightgown slither onto the tiles. I'm sure the moonlight is lighting my face. It always seems to seek me out. My pale, thin features must come from the night.

My voice sounds hardened and I turn it into gentleness mid-word. It never sounds like the voice of my mind.

"Draco?"

He turns quickly. 'What?'

In a few quick, precise strides that makes my waist-long hair fan out behind me, I walk straight to him. This time I don't hide the pain in my voice. I can feel my lips moving. I can feel the breath escaping them. But I can hardly hear the words I whisper, although they echo in my mind.

"I know everything. You don't have to hide it from me."

"You don't know anything!"

My fingers grasp the hem of his left sleeve and I can feel his arm jerk away from me, but it's too late and I've yanked his sleeve above his elbow.

Although I've known and guessed for quite some time now, it's still like a hit in the face of being dunked into cold water. Draco Malfoy, my brother who lent me his broomstick and comforted me over lost teddy bears is no longer a boy. And he's joined them. So many nights I'd prayed for him never to stay off the right path and fall into the abyss designed for him. I saw the shadows crossing his silver eyes before, turning them stormy grey, but I've never seen them black as they are now. Not elaborate, overlapped with emotions… just black.

I step back and my fingers grasp the empty air, holding on to the emptiness that I've known my whole life, but the air itself seemed to be gone and I had nothing to hold to except my own knowledge, my own hidden flames that no one's ever saw. Through all these years, hardly a person can be said to have known me.

His eyes turn to me and pierce me like a spell. His voice tames my fire, freezing the flying ashes and sending them plummeting to the ground.

"I have no choice! He's going to kill me!"

Before I know what I'm doing, my fingers are weaving themselves through his hair and my head is resting on his shoulder. When I speak, I don't choose my words. They don't come from within. They come from everything around me: the oak beds, the dusty quilts, the unevenness of the ceiling that I've always loved, except a Malfoy girl isn't supposed to love. Or cry, for that matter, but I can feel the burning sting of tears on my cheeks.

"I'll find you a way," I manage to gasp out. "I'll find you a way out if it's the last thing I do.

I can feel the tips of his fingers pressing hard on my shoulders as he pushes me back so that I'm looking at him.

"No, Morgana. There isn't a way. There's nothing you can do."

"There is one thing."

He runs his hand through his soft blond hair. I know exactly how it feels because I've played with it a lot, It's usually accompanied by him laughing. I'm not thinking about what I'm saying, I'm thinking about him. Only him. This rarely happens to me. Everyone thinks I'm a delicate little rosebud used to being treated like a princess. But I'm not that. I'm a soldier who would give anything to save the ones they love.

"Let me do it, Draco. Let me do it instead of you."

There's a silence that seems like forever. Maybe it is forever.

"No! No, I'm not letting you! No, Morgan, if you think I'll-"

I quickly interrupt him as a good sister would. "My magic is by no means inferior to yours. Besides, you'll be instantly suspected the second you cross the threshold of Hogwarts. Who is more likely to be planning murder: Draco Lucius Malfoy, or fifteen-year old Morgan? Remember, they don't think I'm right in the head. And if I fail… " I quieten slightly. "I'm not afraid of death."

"No. Never. If you think I'm going to stand here and let you sacrifice yourself for me-"

I sit on the bed again, picking up the weight of my nightgown with my light fingers. I have a thousand things to say to him, but none of them will convince him. He's determined to do this. "Go to sleep."

He points at me, his hand shaking violently. "This conversation is NOT over."

"No, it's not." I feel a sickening weight in my stomach as I lie to my brother. "But we'll continue in the morning. I'm so tired, Draco, come on…"

He slips into bed in the darkness after I've turned out the lamp. I know because I can hear the quilts ruffle. Only he does that. It's odd how much I notice about him. But I guess it's hard to live with someone for fifteen years and not know them. And I realise I'll never forgive myself if I let him do this.

The second I hear his even breathing, I throw the covers off my legs and walk across the bare floor to the window, the frost biting my skin. I scribble a hurried note to Draco on the table. It's excruciatingly simple, but I haven't got time to explain, he's a light sleeper.

_Dear Draco,_

_I'm sorry._

_~Morgana_

Hoping desperately he'll understand, I slide the window open and climb out, my dress catching on the cracks in the bricks. I climb steadily and carefully down, my eyes closed, then when it's not too high I jump and land softly in a patch of grass, wincing slightly from the impact. _Some journeys are meant to be taken alone._

As an owl hoots in the distance I turn my face to the moonlight.

**Thank you for reading, please review! I love you all! Going to camp so the new chapter might not be up for a while ~JT**


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: Sorry it took so long to update, with the first three weeks of freshman year at high school I'm going insane! Got everything on track (finally!) So I'll be writing a LOT more,almost daily, most thank you for the review, Peter! Old rule – one new review, one new chapter! So Read and Review please!**

_Two roads diverged in a yellow wood_

_And I, I took the one less traveled by_

_And that has made all the difference_

_~Robert Frost_

The leaves crunch under my bare feet, still crispy and crumbling from last autumn. I can feel the long strands of my hair tangle in the branches, and repetitively I have to stop, wincing as I rip the ends from the twigs' capture. I can't help thinking that with every step I take I'm getting farther and farther from what is right. I'm walking down a road to doom. Not just my doom. I'm condemning the world to save one person. Letting the Dark Lord use me and my abilities in any way he can imagine. It's wrong. The world should always mean more than any individual person. That's how it works, everyone standing on eachother's shoulders in a human pyramid. If one person shifts their position for comfort, the entire structure cascades to the ground with gleeful shouts from some and painful grunts from others… and right now, I couldn't decide if me and Draco were at the top or the bottom. Perhaps the pyramid was inverted.

The world should never be ruined for one person.

Draco is my world.

The lace and velvet smudge and tear across the barks of oaks. Clouds seem to float down to earth and cover my head like a hood, leaving the only path clear of fog in front of my eyes. The crystalline road to betraying the wizarding world. The road to regret. The road to the end.

I don't know how long I walk, and I doubt I ever will. Odd details swim through my mind. Things I will miss from my life..it almost makes me laugh, the ghosts of my habits glistening from gaps in the black foliage. Cherry sherbet. Silky, soft black pillows. An old, yellowed, frayed notebook with my writing. Suddenly I'm not walking through the forest anymore, holding out my arms to move away the stinging branches. I'm five years old, standing on a sunny, wide deck, the blue water lapping at my toes and Draco holding on to the dock and laughing, his hair shining with beads of water…

I blink so hard that it hurts, yanking myself back to the gloom. Draco. He is the reason for everything. He.

I have to keep walking no matter how much it hurts.

It seemed like an eternity. My skin isn't being pierced by needles – instead I shiver from the ice floor. I feel my hair unfold like a curtain behind me. I look directly at the door. The door is tall, black and plain. To me, that door holds all the evil, all the pain, all the screams in the world in its woodwork, the memories hovering around the handle. I step forward once and a woman's sobbing fills my head, resonating in every shattered piece of my heart, turning it slowly and steadily to ice. I take another step, the fabric of my dress picking up the dust off the floor. A child, yelling for help, losing his voice, because only I can hear him – and I'm not coming. I want to, but even if I could, I wouldn't come. He is not my future – the black door is. I step one last time forward, my fingers wrapping around the handle, which felt colder than any metal I've felt before. This time, a young man's screams fill my ears, and this is where my hand slips, and my legs give way, and I am on my knees before the door. Those are Draco's screams.

I want to run to get the sound out of my head. His voice is filled with so much agony that I feel the urge of killing myself, then and there, to get it out my head. My eyelids close. This is not what I came here for.

I stand up, keeping Draco's face in my mind, turn the handle, and walk straight into the Dark Lord's hideout, known to my family and a few selected others, my head held high, my skin pale as snow, and my silver eyes wide open.

His voice bounces off every wall. "The Malfoy girl, are you? Wanting some of your brother's glory?" He laughed, the red eyes merciless. "You came to die, Morgana."

My being screams to run. Instead I bend my knees and fall to his feet. "I came to serve you, my Lord, and you can rest assured that my loyalties are of the uttermost truthfulness-"

"Crucio."

My body feels like it's on fire. Every part of me is bursting with agony against the chilly summer air. I hear a high voice screaming on a single note, and I mentally note it might be me. I remember falling onto my hands, wanting it all to stop. I couldn't take this. I couldn't do this. Let my brother die, let it be somebody else –

Then relief fills my body, a ring fills my ears, and I am sucked down into blackness.

**AN: This was a bit hurried… but I want to hear your opinions. PLEASE REVIEW! I will be updating a lot from now on. ~Julie**


	3. Chapter 3

**AN: I am SO SORRY for not updating! I'm going insane with homework, it's unbelievable. I'm also working on my own series of books. Hope this longer chapter makes up for it, at least a bit! Oh, and happy belated Halloween and Happy Bonfire night on the 5****th****!**

**Please, please, PLEASE Review! I appreciated the reviews I got SO MUCH! 3**

**Thank you, review and enjoy! ~JT**

I feel my eyelashes tickle the top of my hollow cheeks. I sigh slightly, feeling Mother's fingers pulling my sleeves, and a voice, probably Father's, going "get up, get up, get up…" It sounds like a broken record. I feel a delicate moan escape my lips and I mutter. "Five more minutes…"

The hand jerks me awake and I cry out, hitting my head against something hard. My silver eyes snap open as if hit by a spell and I open my mouth to snap something angrily at my parents.

I inhale sharply as I find myself laying in the Malfoy Manor garden, sharp stones edging themselves into my hips, and my brother's hand around my wrist.

I finally tear my eyes away from him, unable to talk right away, and glance around. Nothing's changed – the sun shines brightly, causing me to squint at the sharp beams diffused by the air. The familiar vine-leaves creep up the iron gates, twisting and coiling themselves around the letters MAL. Mother's bench in the far corner, by the river, is surrounded by mud – around April, there was so much rain that the current was driven out of control, and I would watch the waves rolling over the immortal, weathered oak-wood, baptising it with the icy water once, twice, thrice…

"How. COULD you?!"

His voice is so sharp that my eyes snap back to Draco's face immediately, shocked. " I thought it was for the best."

I'm caught completely off guard as he slaps me across the face. I have never seen him like this. Not once. 'ARE YOU INSANE?! YOU'RE LUCKY TO BE ALIVE RIGHT NOW!"

My cheeks burning and stinging, I look up and am disgusted by the dried tear stains on my eyelashes. "I don't care, you would have been better off! Please just let me go – "

He takes my shoulder, the tips of his fingers digging into my skin so hard it's painful. "I would have had no refuge with you gone! You thought that having your dead body on my conscience would HELP me?! What the bloody hell is wrong with you?! I ought to kill you right now, just for doing it! Kill you so no one else can!"

He's serious. He's screaming at me without a trace of mercy, while I sink back against the grass for a moment, my proud stance crumpling. I hate him. Hate him for putting me on the defensive. I did what was right. I knew I did what was right, but my broken voice said different. "I'm sorry, I swear .."

He cuts me off once again, but not with a yell or a hit, but a tight embrace that leaves me breathless for a moment. I never realised just how tall he had become, nor how comforting his arms were. I notice my fingers lacing themselves around him, and it's now that it hits me, so hard I almost fall unconscious again. I really love my brother. Not simply because "that's how family works" or because "he saved my life" or because "I felt sorry for him". I know I love him with all my being, simply because he's Draco. He was the constant to my variable life, the hand my five-year-old self reached for during Healer visits and those times when we ran out of candles and the Manor was submerged into darkness. My eyes close gently, and I whisper, this time completely consciously: "I did it because I can't live without you."

...

Potions. That Slughorn really is an idiot. A five-page essay on snail venom, a Friday night, was really NOT necessary. I'm fuming, my spine threaded with the iciness of the marble wall behind me, as I sat on the window-sill, parchement scrawled over my knees and a black quill tucked behind my ear, staining my blond hair with dark ink blots. I flip back and forth through the pages of the book in my hands, my eyes capturing the titles alone. "The properties of Moonstone". "Magical Potions in Mechanics". "Disguise and Manipulation". "Commonly-known Venoms and their Antidotes". "History of Medieval Poisonings"…

My slightly long fingernails, painted forest green with silver stripes to match my house, play with the paper. The Hat immediately told me I was a Ravenclaw, five years ago. It told me how intelligent I was, how sharp my mind was, and how perfect the blue and bronze would be for me. It almost got halfway through its comparison of me to Rowena Ravenclaw when I thought, "No." I did not want my family despising me, their Ravenclaw daughter. And so I begged. Begged to be put in Slytherin. Reluctantly, the voice inside the frayed felt hat gave in. I suppose I should be thankful the Hat kept Morgana Malfoy's secret.

I see, then, a tall figure walking brusquely through a side hallway. The boy glances around, long enough for the light to illuminate his pale face framed by the white-blond hair, then darts away into a passage. My books cascade to the floor.

I step down, stuffing my half-finished essay into my bag and swinging it over my shoulder, letting it hit me in the left arm as I walked after him. I need to know if he had done it.

Realising that my heels were echoing across the hall, I kick my shoes off and continues walking in thin socks. It's very warm for the end of May, nor very cold for the beginning of June. I slide around a corner just in time to see him throwing open a door. I sighed as my fingers managed to grasp the quickly disappearing handle. _Leave him alone, Morgan._

I ignore the voice of my mind and creep through the crack. My knees scream in discomfort as I crouched behind a pile of junk in what seems like a never-ending chapel filled with rubbish. I can only see my brother's hands through a tiny space in between two broken chairs. He opens a cabinet and waves his wand around. _What?_

Half an hour later, Draco turns and leaves the room, cursing. The door slams and I scramble out into the open quickly, before the chairs have the chance to bury me alive. My breath seems a few times louder as I approach the cabinet, with its carved markings and dusty latches. I gasp, and stared the inscriptions at my eye level. "invisibilis per iter spatio et tempore". I knew now that this was a Vanishing Cabinet. And that meant that Draco needed a passage into the castle. I then notice that there are manual repair books scattered around. I stare for a moment, until it clicks. _He needs to mend it._ I pull out my wand and take a deep breath.

The next evening, my eyes are drawn to something in the sky that would make anyone else scream, but makes me thoughtful. The skull is brighter than ever and the snake viciously coiles across the horizon. I know what he must have done. What I had done.

And what the world was condemned to.


	4. Chapter 4

**AN: So sorry for not posting this sooner, school is getting crazier! I've also been in a bet to read an 800-page book… I won, but that's not the point. Anyway, I hope you can forgive me and here is the next chapter of Hidden Fire.**

**P.S. After the completion of this fan fiction, I and a few of my friends will film a video to the finale on our acting channel. Can't wait! And yes, I will be playing Morgan. **

One step at a time. I take careful, precise care to step only on the toe of my elegant leg-hugging boots, as the heels will irrevocably raise mayhem. I cringe painfully as a thin, pitiable creak emerges from the staircase below me. _Almost there, Morgana._

After what seems like a thousand years of sliding palms against harsh stone and balancing precariously on thins trips of well-secured wood, I make it to the top. I can see the landing of the Astronomy tower. Deep below, as if remnants of a naïve, childhood fantasy, lights twinkled, each red or green flash, meaning life or death, seeming like perfectly placed candles on a Christmas tree. I and Draco used to decorate those back home – when it used to be considered home to me. He would always get to add the finishing touches my empty mind had so desired simply because he was taller. I would wait on the bottom, enveloped in what I then considered grief, but what I would now consider bliss.

Memories come spinning back into my head as I brush a strand of very long, blond hair from my face. Now I am not standing at the top of the stairs, watching my brother destroy his fate, but lying softly in my own bed, cuddled in the sheets like a nest – now I am not sixteen, battered by the simple, cruel proses of life but seven, with my big silvery eyes clear and trustful.

I remember it perfectly – it was a warm August evening. For some reason it stayed in my memory.

"Morgan?" Came Draco's frantic whisper.

"What?" I replied sleepily.

"They said there would be a storm tonight."

I looked to the ceiling, amused, a smile creeping onto my lips. "And your point?"

"I thought... I thought you might be scared."

I laughed, taunting him. "More like you are, in your bed all alone, the thunder – "

"Alright, alright!" Came the answer. "Just shut up! No, I didn't mean to say that – "He tried to fix it as he heard my faint laughter. "Would you please just come?"

"Fine." I kicked back the covers and slid into his bed. It was comforting, in a way, sleeping with my brother – he was warm and comfortable, and him putting his arm around me would make me feel safe, even if it was to keep himself from being frightened as the forks of lightning shot through the black sky, illuminating our faces. "Draco?" I whispered.

"You don't have to say it," he muttered sleepily. "I love you too, Morgana."

That was the morning before Father showed him the Unforgivable and cut Draco away from me forever. We never did get to do that again.

…

"Draco, you are no assassin…"

I could see it, even though I could hardly see anything from my hiding spot. More so, I could feel it. My brother was about to lower his wand. _Do it, Draco,_ I pleaded in my mind. _Please. Don't make me choose that side because it's yours._

The next second, I was pushed into the wall brutally as Aunt Bella, the Carrows, Greyback, and a few others I didn't recognise burst onto the platform. As I felt the cold shills down my spine, I felt something else. Something real, flesh, warmth... someone must be there, invisible, ready to kill –

Before I could formulate that thought, something had finally dawned on Bella. About to threaten Draco, she leaped over to the staircase and seized me by the collar, my hair tugging down.

Her voice was honeyed, sappy and melodic. "Going somewhere, Morgana?"

"That's the Malfoy girl," Barked Greyback. "I KNOW!" Roared Bellatrix, a spell missing him by inches, then looking back to me, her smile condescending but her eyes hard as stone. "Sorry to spoil your little night out… but, you see, Morgana… -"she traced my face with her wand- "This table is occupied."

I struggled in vain – wrists against the wall, breath escaping in gasps, I could only focus on those huge, voluminous black eyes, tugging every bit of happiness from the world, from my soul. I bit m lip hard, drawing blood, to keep myself from answering her.

I shouldn't have bothered – she didn't want an answer. With a violent jerk, she pulled me to the barrier. I could feel empty air behind me, my Hogwarts skirt drifting eerily. Her wand was jammed to my throat, pushing me. My hands found no hold, grasping the air furtively.

One wish and she could push me over the edge. My wand was too far to reach.

I wasn't scared of Bellatrix Lestrange – not any more than I was scared of death itself. The looming dark figure had been for me an image of fairytales – no one could really, actually die… it was just a story… death was something that I have seen, but hadn't felt – the tragic end to any deeply written narrative. If she pushed me, I would not die – or so said my mind. My heart, though, was counting every beat as its last.

Draco's eyes locked with mine for a single second, then he turned back to Dumbledore, his wand aimed squarely, nothing less than pure terror in his face now. "I don't have a choice anymore. That's my sister," He tried to say.

Bellatrix put a bit of weight on my chest, causing me to lean back so far that, really, only my heels were touching the steel railing between life and death. My breathing became heavy and I looked into the stars, my trained eyes immediately finding the constellation Draco. _So this is how I will die,_ I thought. _Predictable ending, what's for dinner, mum?_

I was insane. I was hysterical with fear, although I could never admit it to anyone but myself and the stars. Behind my calm, calculating face, I was screaming until my voice grew hoarse – and then some more until all that was left of me was dust.

"Does it hurt to die, Morgana?" The screaming voice in my head asked. "I don't know," my thoughts echoed in my mind. "Do you care?"

Even in May, I could see my breath escaping into the night air. Every breath meant I was still alive, still here … and Draco was still fighting.

Unable to look at him, I screamed out loud when I heard "Avada Kedavra" in a different voice, however familiar. I could not register at the time. I felt the pressure lessen and I fell into a heap on the floor of the landing, straightening up. I gasped, although knowing in my mind he was dead. "Draco – "

He looked at me, his eyes just as shocked. Then we simultaneously turned to see Dumbledore falling as though in a distant dream. I remember someone grabbing my shoulder, spinning me and Draco around, and forcing us down the stairs – then pushing me onto a floor, the hand still forcing Draco down the steps, into the grounds, and out of here. I sat on the floor, the black skirt covering me in a circle, then, for the second time in my life, I fell unconscious and all fell into a ringing, choking blackness.


	5. Chapter 5

**AN: Hey everyone, I'm back and alive, hope you enjoy! ~JT**

_But if you stay, I'll make you a day_

_Like no day has been, or will be again._

_We'll sail the sun, we'll ride on the rain,_

_We'll talk to the trees, we'll worship the wind… _

_But if you go, I understand,_

_Just give me enough love to hold in your hand…_

_~If you go Away (Dusty Springfield)_

The hallway comes into focus again, slowly but steadily – I'm reminded of a window-pane unfogging over the course of two weeks, like they do in Malfoy Manor. The torches on the walls, the violent flame leaping from them, the delicate curve of the staircase to my right, the stitches of a faraway tapestry… but, to my amazement, that's not all that I see.

A face is close to me. I can't yet see the details since my eyes are still fogged, but there's bright red hair framing it. The eyes are blue-green, a bit like my mother's, but more masculine. The boy has a slightly defined jaw, an uneven haircut, and I can tell that his fingers are on my white wrist. I blink, and I see him clearer – the reddish eyelashes and chapped lips, the nose baptised in freckles, the slightly lopsided ears.

I sit, pushing myself up, and quickly tug my skirt to make sure it covers me, although it's knee-length. Subconsciously, I can feel his fingernails digging gently into my wrist, pulling me up. Then he stares at me – just stares. I don't know him and I don't have any reason to think that he knows me. I feel my eyelashes flutter.

"Who are you?" He asks.

I don't know what I was expecting, possibly for him to ask if I was alright. Then again, no one's ever asked that but Draco – why should the boy be any different?

"Morgan." I state shakily, deciding to drop the last name that drives so many away from me, and the A at the end of 'Morgana'. It makes my name too memorable. I wasn't sure if I wanted him to remember me yet.

"What happened to you?"

"I fell from – down the stairs," I make up on the spot.

"You fainted."

"That's happened before."

He's analysing me. I know it. Although he doesn't seem intelligent enough to deduce who I am. He glances with hatred at my Slytherin tie and then looks back at me. "Isn't the dungeon on the other side of the castle?"

"So what?"

"So I might as well take you hostage. Your house isn't welcome here."

"I haven't done anything, yet you're the one hating me… isn't that the opposite of what you're implying?"

He seems to falter. "Fine. Morgan, get up, you're alright." He pulls me up again, and this time I can feel every pulse of blood through his fingers. His eyes are still looking at me. I quickly follow routine – is my chest covered, is my skirt down, is the bottom of my shirt too high… But I find I am unable to do it.

For the first time in my life, I am lost in someone's eyes.

His eyes are blue, after all. Soft and twinkling, like gentle waves of an ocean. There's light in them – the sunlight bouncing off the rims of the water. The blue is swirling, drawing me in, enveloping me in ice, fire and air –

"Answer the question."

I blink and the waves calm. "Sorry, what did you ask?"

"What are you doing here?"

"Oh." I bite my lip. " I was, um… well… none of your business." I finish coolly.

He looks at me like I was a sign-up sheet barely worthy of his notice. I don't understand. There are tens, hundreds of boys lost in the mystique of Morgana Malfoy – those who would serve my every need, and let themselves be played like strings on a violin … not him. On the other hand – I can feel _my_ heartbeat speeding up and I'm ready to step forward. His lips are slightly parted as he talked, and I watch.

I'm ready to slap myself right across the face once I feel my cheeks gently gaining color. Malfoys didn't blush, but I can still feel the soft sprinkle of rose on my cheekbones. _Merlin, Morgana…._

He says something that I don't distinguish, then turns and scurries up the stairs. I wait, and then step to the stairs for a moment. I'm almost ready to follow… but what would Draco say….

_Draco._

Everything suddenly snaps into place. Draco is who knows where, being tortured, or already dead, and I'm standing in a hallway, thinking about the eyes and the lips of a ginger boy whose name I don't know.

I turn around and bolt down the hallway, then slide down the railing of the stairs to the bottom. Throwing my body against the doors, I manage to open them and run out into the grounds. Everyone is here – except for Draco and the Death Eaters. There's a vast crowd surrounding the bottom of the Tower, looking down at something, and then I see, one after the other, every student in Hogwarts raising their wand into the sky. Thousands of light flecks, mimicking stars, in a half-circle around a motionless figure.

I don't approach to watch. I know where Draco must be.

I run to the gates as fast as I could, taking the handle and turning it, but a hand on top of mine stops me.

The girl is looking straight at me, almost accusingly. She's very beautiful, sure – if I pride myself to know of beauty. But she isn't like me, playing with emotions like a siren from a fable. Rather, she's simple.

Her face is a bit unsymmetrical, and that draws attention to her immediately. Her frizzy, wild hair spills all over her shoulders, and her eyes are almost black, lined with soft brown. She looks over me as if I was something for sale, but doesn't let go of her grip. "So _you're _Morgan."

"So what if I-"

"Where's Draco?"

I stop and look more carefully at the girl. She's very short, and I think she's about a year younger than me – fourth year. Her tie is blue and bronze, and there are silver pins in her messy hair.

"Who are you?"

"Astoria. Astoria Greengrass."

I sigh. So _this_ is the girl Draco's fond of… I bite my lip, thinking, tasting blood on my tongue. If I bring her along, she may die, but then again, if I don't…

"Fine."

I take her by the wrist, pull her through the gates, and we dissaparate in an elegant whirl.


	6. Chapter 6

_One step at a time there's no need to rush_

_It's like learning to fly or falling in love_

_It's gonna happen and it's supposed to happen_

_That we find the reasons why, one step at a time_

_~One step at a time (Jordin Sparks)_

Glass had never felt this cold. The frost simmers through my fingers, down every vein in my hand, down to my heart, and up to my brain. I can see my fingertips, the long nails painted green and silver, resting against the clear wall. Then I hear the voice, I see the flash, and he falls to his knees, although I can't hear him through the wall. And I shriek.

Ten minutes later, I'm not even myself, watching my brother be tortured from behind a glass frame. I'm wild. I can feel myself thrashing and pounding against the wall, my hair in my mouth, screaming, losing my voice, tears now pouring across my collarbone. Then I feel someone's frail, thin hands pull me back from the glass.

I turn around and look into those brown eyes. _Has she no mercy?_ She seems unfazed. He is being tortured and Astoria doesn't seem to care. But once I look a little deeper, I know she does care. More than anything. Yet I'm the one desperately scratching the wall.

Wordlessly, she puts her arms around me tightly. "Just don't look, Morgan.." She whispers. "You can't do anything, he doesn't want you to see.. just… don't look." She looks at me, like a mother would look at her child. "Alright?"

I nod softly. Some part of me wishes my real mother would ever look at me like that. Neither of my parents ever cared for me – it was always Draco this, Draco that, it is so bloody important to have an heir in the family… I was an accident and they let me know it, every chance they had. Then, when at the age of eight I started seeing things, they considered putting me up for adoption.

No one wanted a Seer girl in the house.

I would block it all out. I could see the future but I've always kept silent, as though I was dead – no one knew those visions haven't gone away. I can, with the step of my foot, traverse time and space as easily as walk into a closet. And throughout the mist and the shadows, I know. I feel. I live.

I can see Astoria sitting against the wall, hiding her face in her arms. She's breathing, second by second, like the rhythm of a perfectly tuned clock. Counting down the seconds to the world's undoing.

_Awfully pessimistic, Morgan._

…

"Shut up!"

Astoria manages a sarcastic smile, cross-legged on a couch. "So you're saying you didn't glance at him pants? I'm shocked, you're no vir-"

"I said _shut up!"_

I bite my lip, paling instead of blushing. _Would she stop nagging me already?!_

"Alright, so your special little innocent someone has red hair and blue eyes. What else?"

"He's a Gryffindor."

She gasped slightly in mock shock. "You just want the whole package, don't you?!"

…

A month later, I'm sitting in my bedroom again. It's still ours, mine and Draco's, but it usually seems like my own. He's lost the spring in his step, the laugh in his words, the smile to every inconvenience. I've chased the house-elves from the floor. Now I sit on the floor, alone, and for the first time, my gowns hang untouched in the corner. Anyone of any meaning to my parents would scream at me – no gold, no skirts, no emeralds…

I wonder what they would say if they saw Morgana in jeans and a sweatshirt.

There's nothing out the window that I hadn't seen before. The marsh, the dusty gravel roads, the pale bursts of sunlight, the tent –

_Tent?!_

I get up instantly and run to the window, kneeling down on the winow-sill and throwing the curtains apart. It is indeed a tent – and outside it is sitting a tall boy with red hair. Even from this distance, I recognise him. Then I look back to the doorway.

Choose. Your brother and what is wrong or the boy and what is right?

The choice seems so eerily, mystiquely simple..

I could have everything with the boy. _Freedom. Laughter. Victory. Honor_. I can picture myself dancing, repelling spells, saving lives, and slowly but surely clearing the world of Lord Voldemort. The pureness, the cleanliness, the beauty of it all almost makes me suffocate. I practically fall out of the window in longing for the tent.

Then I step back.

And I pull the curtains tightly back together.


	7. Chapter 7

_You show the lights that stop me turn to stone_

_You shine it when I'm alone_

_And so I tell myself that I'll be strong_

_And dreaming when they're gone_

_'Cause they're calling, calling, calling me home_

_Calling, calling, calling home_

_You show the lights that stop me turn to stone_

_You shine it when I'm alone_

_~Lights (Ellie Goulding)_

I'm done. I'm done. I'm completely done.

I lay in my covers in the fetal position. My thin fingers crack my freezing toes and my hair curls, tangles and splashes over my knees. My silver eyes have lost their burn over the course of the last few months. I can't keep doing this. Soon enough, my life will become a simple sacrifice for my brother. I suppose it would be a noble way to die, but I'm done being noble. I don't want to die. Merlin, I'm fifteen years old!

_Sixteen. I turned sixteen without noticing it._

My blond eyelashes gently stroke my waterline, the salty droplets stringing to the end of each lash then, with a sound so loud that it echoes in my soul, fall to the floor. Tears. I've never cried. I've always held my head high and stepped straight and held a wand in front of my eyes. I was never scared.

But I've never felt so vulnerable.

I don't remember ever praying like I did now For hours, for days, without any logical thought – a child begging for mercy. Merlin, I never remember thinking. It was step by step. Protect Draco, one. Protect my family, two. Save the world, three. One, two, three, victory!

But it isn't that simple. And when I turned sixteen, I learned that truth. There has to be a choice between one and two, and three. A difference that is not mine to make. I can't change Fate, I can't change Destiny. And I can't win a war against a multi-thousand army, one equipped with Dark Magic and desperation and ice-cold hearts. I've made myself the equal of men, but men don't cry. Women do. Am I a girl? Deep in my soul, I know I'm not – I've been through too much to be innocent enough to be a girl. Naïve enough. I'm cunning, like a woman who has seen it all.

But I can cry.

I grab a vase, toss it at the wall, and watch it break to pieces along with what's left of me.

…

"-Into the great hall immediately."

I straighten up. The Great Hall. That could only mean one thing – he has been sighted. And THAT could mean nothing but war, war to its core, war until every last bit of sanity that Hogwarts has is destroyed. I reach for Draco but he's already gone. What's it to him? A little sister lost in a world of her own, a world of want, lust, and caring. Maybe with a bit of evil to it, but a good kind of evil.

I've always believed in good kinds of evil.

I run out of the library where we all were, but I see him. The boy with the red hair. He's running somewhere with a brunette. She has curly hair, not too long. She wears a mauve sweater tainted with dirt, jeans, sneakers and what looks like a black shirt . I hear pieces of their conversation.

-To the chamber !

-But that's absurd, Ron, we can't get in –

- I'll try something, Mione, just trust me. FASTER! It's going to sta –

- Ron, stop it. Just run.

So his name was Ron.

I kept watching him run with her. Who was that girl? Or rather, that woman – none of us had minds young enough to be called girls. She was beautiful. And she sounded smart. Was she his sister, his friend, his classmate?

His girlfriend?

Why did I care so much?

I wanted him. I realised that I wanted him. This was like realising that Joan of Arc wanted a man. It made me root to the spot, filling me with dread and horror, but also a kind of a light, candle-lit spark. The kind of spark that can't start a rebellion – that's the only kind I've ever had.

The kind of candle that can keep you alive. That lives in nurses and teachers and in Andromeda Tonks – I've heard of her. The candle that makes you want to walk, not run. I stretch out my hand to him. My fingers seem to touch him, although he's a hundred metres away, and a child goes through me.

-RON!

He turns around, startled, as I run to him, my blond hair unraveling. I barely catch my breath.

-You're looking for the chamber of Secrets.

-So what if I am?

- How do you plan to get in?

- I'll try Parseltongue – wait, what's it to you –

I grab him arm and hiss softly. "Listen again, closely. It's what you need to do to open it, there's a panting in my house of a man who could speak it. I know it perfectly. LISTEN."

I hiss again, and this time he listens to the hardness and the tone of the voice, his blue eyes focused on mine.

His eyes felt so good…

_So good…._

Before I know it, I slide to him, meeting his height, my eyes close, my arm snakes around his neck, and I press my lips to his.

**AN:/ I am SO sorry for not updating earlier. I've been going through some traumatic things in school, as well as a homework overload, but I am determined to finish this the way it's planned. Thank you for staying 3**


	8. Chapter 8

_I was thinkin' 'bout her, thinkin' 'bout me_

_Thinkin' 'bout us, what we gonna be_

_Opened my eyes_

_It was only just a dream_

_So I traveled back down that road_

_Wish he'd come back, no one knows_

_I realized_

_It was only just a dream_

_~Nelly_

He pushes me back and stares at me. His eyes open and close and for the first time in fifteen – no, sixteen – years I blush. A tingling warmth creeps through my skin, across my cheekbones and up the bridge of my nose.

It disappears once he slaps me.

The brunette girl looks at me with hatred. "This is a war, not a kiss-fest." She grabs the redhead boy's hand and pulls him along, turning swiftly into a passageway. And once his face disappears, my heart falls out of the cavity, turns to ice and smashes into a billion shards on the marble flooring. I kick the shards back with my heel, taking a minute to collect myself. A fight rages inside my small head, one to run and one to stay. At long last my fingers travel up my chest, connecting the split skin and bonding it into one, solid but broken body.

…

His voice booms through the nerves in my brain and my eardrums and I let out a piercing scream, sliding to the floor. All eyes are on me and a few other girls doing the same. I can hear it clearly, merlin, so clearly – clear like he was standing next to me, whispering to me, his bony fingers wrapped tight around my neck.

"Harry Potter is Dead….Dead…..Deeeaaddd…"

I stand up once the voice fades away. The Hall is no longer a collection of statues, but a joustling myriad of feet, elbows and hips. I slide in as the human current spins me around and coughs me up into the courtyard.

Hagrid, the giant I've seen a few times, is holding a body. Presumably, it's Harry, although at this distance… but what interest has he to lie? And He is standing right in front of us, his red eyes scanning the crowd, detecting every rebellious bend of a finger.

…

When he asks us to join him, not a soul moves. No one moves, not even the butterflies in the bushes. But then a step echoes across the courtyard. A step I know so well, a step I grew up with, a step – _MERLIN, NO!_

My brother has handed his soul to the devil. Morgan, what have you done…

Perhaps it's due to our connection, but I feel what he feels. I feel his fear and his stone heart not allowed to beat. I feel the Dark Lord's wrinkly, icy arms wrapped around my torso, and the momentary relief at the release. I cannot believe when he joins our parents.

And I find myself feeling jealous. They'd never hold me like that.

Sure enough, I am not called. A piercing grey glare is all I receive.

After Draco traverses the courtyard, all is still once more. My eyes comb through the landscape when I see it.

_Harry's arm is moving._

If He notices, this is the end. The true end of Harry Potter. My brother condemned to love what he hates, Ron thrown into prison, Hogwarts and the beauty of magic blown to smithereens. He can't notice. I can't LET him notice!

A single thought slips through my mind.

_Diversion. _

At whatever cost that diversion comes.


	9. Chapter 9

_Diversion._

_At whatever cost that diversion comes. _

This is it. Deep in my heart, I know this is it. There is no more but, no more reasons, no more logic. It makes me laugh now how cold I used to be. How easily I could close myself up, when now I feel like a china doll overflowing with emotion.

_This is what I've been training for. _

I take a single step from the staircase. At once, as though by the wave of a wand, the crowd parts in half. The little feet shuffle backwards and disappear, like a wave rolling off to leave me a path. I cannot look at the faces of the people who walked the halls of Hogwarts. Hatred, disgust, menace… if only they knew what was going through my mind.

_This is what I've been living for. _

I lift my chin and I look up. Right into those burning-red eyes. My hair sifts and swirls around my scarred face. A childish thought slips through my mind. I want to know whether or not I look nice in these earrings.

A girl's shout is heard from the side. "Morgan, no!"

I snap my head to the shout so quickly it makes a small crack and I wince. Astoria is at the brims of the crowd, her hair a curly mess, her eyes overrun with tears and her face covered in blood. At a single blast from the Dark Lord's wand, she is thrown back, her cry cutting off and only the sounds of people helping her up being heard. She just made herself an outcast.

But it was nice to hear her voice.

It was so nice to hear _someone's_ voice.

I take another step and those who had doubts step sharply away from me, bumping into others. I see them, Ron holding hands with the brunette. I sigh. Let them be happy, then, god bless. Let them live and have beautiful red-haired children and sleep together, whispering comforting things into eachother's ears. Let them.

Outside, I am stone-hard. But inside, I am screaming. Screaming for help, screaming for mercy, screaming for someone to hear me! Merlin damn it, I'm sixteen years old! I don't want to do this, I want to LIVE! Panic floods my body the tips of my fingers shaking and my hair obtaining a life of its own. The powers I have, the talents I posess, all will be sacrificed. I DON'T WANT TO!

I take another step.

In this way I walk all across the courtyard. As he sneers, a million things flash through my mind like playing cards. Like the playing cards of this stupid, but oh so honorable game we call Life. The taste of Ron's lips, honeysuckle and blueberry. Mother reading a book by the fireplace, her face lit by the flickering flames. Flying a broom. Me, creeping through the woods and untangling hair from branches. Five-year-old Draco climbing a maple tree with childish, gleeful laughter.

And then I raise my silver eyes, and the bright red slits of his eyes meet the clear orbs of mine. Death is a soft, caring gentleman.

I step to the side, spread my fingers gracefully and curtsey, without taking my eyes off the Dark Lord's, and then I smile.

"One last duel, _my lord_?"

_The green light comes in a flash. But I know._

_The world is safe._

**AN: Thank you so much to everyone who has reviewed this story and who has helped me with this! I fell in love with Morgana and I hope you enjoyed my writing **** There will be an epilogue posted later, but this is where the story ends. Goodbye and thank you to all.**


	10. Epilogue

Draco walked down the platform. It was a windy, gusty autumn day, unlike the pleasant sunshine of the year before, as the smoke from the Hogwarts Express billowed and bristled through the air. Scorpius was walking ahead of him with Astoria, tugging on her sleeve, impatient to get back to school, practically shaking her off and dragging his trunk to the carriage, lifting it inside. In Draco's hand were the soft fingers of an eleven-year old girl, gazing with wonder at the world before her. Every squawk of an owl, every groan of a wheel made her big, silver eyes flicker towards the source, the everlasting, sweet, condescending smile on her lips. At last she brushed away her long blond locks, letting Draco put her carriage in the train for her, then looked to her father.

"Will I like it there?"

"Knowing you, you'll love it there," he answered, meeting her childish, but already thoughtful eyes. "Just like a girl I knew once. She didn't have the chance to love anything, but I think she did love Hogwarts nonetheless. She made great sacrifices for it."

The girl gazed up in wonder, her crisp collar framing her neck and biting her lip. "Where is she now?"

"Far away from here, dear," He said quietly. "Never you mind. Go, Athene Morgana, and let Hogwarts start a new chapter in your life. "

She nodded, then kissed her father goodbye and skipped off to the train, grabbing the handlebars and hoisting herself into the compartment. With one final wave she was gone, Astoria now giving her final instructions to her son.

Draco looked down. In his other hand was a letter – written nineteen years ago, but still fresh, the ink seeped into the page.

_"Do not mourn me, brother. There is nothing to be mourned. I chose my death – and I knew I would die this way. I had a vision, a few days or weeks before – I can't remember. But if you are reading this, I am dead, and I have sacrificed myself to Lord Voldemort – do not fear his name – for the sake of Victory. We have won. Rejoice, my brother, do not mourn._

_I want you to know that I gave my soul for you. My purpose was to save your life and save the purity of it, and do not question that purpose. It is a sin to question the desire of the dead. _

_Do not waste it._

_Also, I want you to remember that day. When the lightning flashed across the sky, and you huddled to me, and we felt asleep peacefully in eachother's arms. Do you remember? The last day we were truly, truly family. _

_I remember what you said. You don't need to say it. _

_I love you too, Draco. _

_Sincerely, Morgana Malfoy. _

_P.S. I have no will, but if I owned anything, it's all yours."_

Draco looked down at the paper, then at the little girl, pushing her way into a compartment and laughing at an owl. She will know someday. Someday. But not today.

_Let her be a child for as long as she wants to._


End file.
